amadeus
Bishop of Bio-Dome
Someone asks you: hey, how far away is x?
Do you say the distance or time it takes to get there?
Do you say the distance or time it takes to get there?
Time and distance in measurements
- Thread starter amadeus
- Start date
Gori the Grey
The Poster
- Joined
- Jan 5, 2009
- Messages
- 13,356
Depends a little on what x is, who's asking, and in what context. But my default would probably be to answer in terms of time.
Bamspeedy
CheeseBob
Not a hard rule, but if it's far, time. If it's close (less than half hour), distance. "Next town over is 6 miles away". "Madison/Milwaukee/Minneapolis/Chicago is x hours away."
Time is assuming the person will travel by car/truck on highway, which is the case 99.99% of the time when asking about distance from one city to another. For how far apart two points are within city, I would guess the number of blocks, or "other side of town".
Time is assuming the person will travel by car/truck on highway, which is the case 99.99% of the time when asking about distance from one city to another. For how far apart two points are within city, I would guess the number of blocks, or "other side of town".
Marla_Singer
United in diversity
In an urban context, it rarely makes sense to talk in kilometric distances as those are rarely relevant, if even known. So we usually go with "10 minutes by foot" or "30 minutes by metro". Even people living in the suburbs and using roads like better talking in time taking into account usual traffic jams.
However, in a more rural area, with road signs everywhere indicating kilometric distances and a free-flowing traffic, people talk more in distance according to my experience.
However, in a more rural area, with road signs everywhere indicating kilometric distances and a free-flowing traffic, people talk more in distance according to my experience.
Last edited:
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- Sep 21, 2012
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if on foot, I always consider distance not time, because I'm a pretty fast walker (whole lots of walking for exercise), so time is irrelevant to me then
EnglishEdward
Deity
Well very far away distances are measured in light years which are both measurements of distance and time.
In town driving: time. In state driving: time: beyond that distance.
People who understand that light-years and parsecs are units of distance, not time, tend to snicker at Han Solo bragging that his ship "made the Kessel Run in 12 parsecs". Someone on the writing team goofed there.
I tend to express distance in terms of time, when it's something I'm familiar with, as when we lived in the house and the transit routes were changed, it took 8 minutes to get to the bus stop. The nearest grocery store was 15 minutes. Downtown was 20-30 minutes (depending on how fast I could walk and how many shortcuts I took). These times are based on walking, as I've never driven.
Those times are different now, of course, as I use mobility devices to get around and speed depends on how easy the sidewalk or pavement is to get around on, and how much energy I have that day. This is why I rarely leave this building in the winter - some places may as well be on the Moon, since there are places where nobody ever bothers to shovel or clear the ice away. Snow removal in this city is not done with pedestrians in mind, or even people who use transit. Big piles of snow at bus stops aren't unusual.
If someone asks how far it is to the next cities here, my answer would be "90 minutes". It could actually be less now, as there has been expansion in both north and south of all three cities.
People tell me that such-and-such a place is "X" hours by plane. Of course they mean after they've spent the 90 minutes getting to either Calgary or Edmonton, because while Red Deer has an airport, it's not a large one. I actually don't even know where it is. I can't relate to distances like that, as I've never flown anywhere other than a casual plane ride to see Central Alberta from the air. We didn't actually end up in a different place from where we started.
The context of the conversation will likely suggest whether the person is interested to know how long it takes to get to x, or the distance to x. How long it takes, depends entirely on the choice of transportation, while the distance is likely the same either way.
EnglishEdward
Deity
Well quite, yes, it is when archaic superman Samson travels at relativistic speeds.
